Running Rich, fixing it one piece at a time

[bbbbaad]

I finally got my car to pass VA emissions last night, but the car is obviously running very rich. I am going to go about fixing this in a logical manner, I hope, and asking you (the experts) for your advice.

I have 1700 miles on the engine after being rebuilt by Ron's Custom Auto (New Jersey) who is no longer there. Jack Merkel did the engine machining and he is still around and very helpful.

Indications of rich (I think): When I pulled the plugs to tune for emissions, they were very black. I am getting about 139 miles to a tank of fuel (93 oct) where I used to get 240 religiously prior to the engine build. When I turn the car off, the fuel pressure drops 20 pounds after about 20 minutes. I used top cleaner and a HUGE amount of white smoke came out. The exhaust smells very rich. I used Eric Marshall's advice and disconnected the O2 sensor, went into open loop, leaned out the car and it passed emissions.

I am getting good readings on Turbolink and can adjust BLMs using the pressure regulator. I have the IAC and TPS set to spec, INT is 128, O2 runs between 100 and 800, normally in the green.

I suspect a leak ahead of the O2 sensor (new one installed last week) and possibly faulty injectors. Since Ron's Shop has shut down, I have been uncertain of the bolt-on stuff he did and now I suspect that the injectors are either bad or really not 009's. Other possibilities are: Bad ECM?? Cracked exhaust header?? Vacuum leak?? (I searched high and low for these, but could have missed one)

I think I am best to start with the injectors first, unless someone can point me in another direction. Should I take them out and have them bench tested? If so, where? Should I just buy new ones and be done with it? If so, who is the trusted source?

Am I headed in the right direction? Any advice would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks

Andy

 

[imjoesnuffy]

injectors

Sounds like you have an injector leaking or stuck open. Any of the plugs wet?Were they new injectors installed 1700 miles ago? Cleaning them will cost you around 100-120 depending on shipping. Several places clean and flow them for you. Casper will do it, witchhunter.com is another.

I didn't see an upgraded Fuel Pump in your sig. I would probably start there. It may not be causing your problem, but you will need to get an upgraded fuel pump and have it hotwired, to make sure your setup never runs short on fuel. If you have a stock pump that is almost 20 years old, it was barely enough for 28 lb injectors. Now you have 42.5 lb injectors, it won't be enough.

 

[TurboBuRick]

Hey Andy, you got it to pass? Good for you! Thats got to be a weight off.
Generally if o2's are 800 and below and your BLM's are within 10 +/- of 128 everything should be fine.

Can you post pics and show us the plugs?

Just for the record I am no expert. Thats a big word in my book. There is always something to be learned. Does'nt matter who you are. :biggrin:

 

[bbbbaad]

Plug Pics

Yes, I did pass and great thanks to those that assisted. It is much easier to move forward now that the monkey is off my back.

Here is a picture of the plugs. Hindsight would have told me to mark which cylinder they came out of and I would know which one caused the black plug, but I didn't.

I updated the post to include the pump, regulator and hot wire kit.

I am thinking new 42.5 lb injectors are in order, rather than sinking money into testing the current ones. I don't think I want to go higher than 42.5, but I really don't know. I want to make this a nice streetable ride that is honorable when I push on the pedal but I don't become a slave to it every day.

Some of my wishes are: MAFTPro, Alky, ???, anything that makes it resilient and ready whenever I push on the pedal to go fast without breaking. The lower end of the engine was built for 10 second runs, the bolt-ons are not there. I don't have real aspirations of going 10 sec, maybe 11.5 on occasion, but that would mean that I need to be better than the 14.5 driver I am currently.

Andy

 

[TurboBuRick]

It was on my mind to tell you to mark them but I forgot to mention.

They don't look all that bad to me. The first one is a little black.
Looks like your on the right track. May have a bad injector.
42.5 injectors are a popular choice and can support into 11's

Caspers claeaned a set for me and charged me $85 + freight. About $7 shipping.

 

[ES1]

Post numbers on injectors and see if we can tell what they are.

 

[TurboBuRick]

PhotoPost Classifieds - 009's and RA93 Chip - Powered by PhotoPost Classifieds

 

[bbbbaad]

Injector Numbers

Post numbers on injectors and see if we can tell what they are.

I took two numbers off of an injector:
1612
01D0308 (kinda tough to read that small but looks very close to this)

They also have a blue stripe around the tops.

Thanks

Andy

 

[TurboBuRick]

I took two numbers off of an injector:
1612
01D0308 (kinda tough to read that small but looks very close to this)

They also have a blue stripe around the tops.

Thanks

Andy

Those are 009's 42.5 lb injectors. I would have to say If you want to buy new ones, you might as well upgrade. I think you can go as big as 60 lb without ECM mods. Bigger injectors could give you more uptop. You may get down the road and decide to do other things and need more fuel on the top end. This way your one step ahead. It would not change your gas milage on regular driving. If you don't want to do that, me personaly, I would have the ones you have now cleaned. But thats just me. :biggrin:
If you do decide to go bigger on the injectors you will need your chip reconfigured to what ever you decide to go with. Just food for thought.

 

[Roc87]

I would also suggest going for the 60# injectors. I have them and IF I keep my foot out of it, it'll still get around 18mpg around in town. You may as well get as big of an injector as you can without modding the ecm, that way as time goes by and you want to go faster you won't have to keep getting bigger injectors. Mileage/Drivability isn't affected by having these injectors with a good chip.

I had the 009 injectors in my Turbo'd Iroc and I could never get it running all that good.

 

[bbbbaad]

My Thoughts

I appreciate all of your advice. I have also done a lot of research on the forum and web and have come up with what I think is the best approach, but looking for anyone's input on where I may be going wrong.

Goals:
1. Having a respectable street machine.
2. Protect the engine from grenading when I do decide to go WOT.
3. Gaining control over the engine and computer to tweak it as I see fit
4. Run she must, shine she may (an old Navy term from an old Navy guy)

So, here are the upgrades I see putting on the car:
1. Razor GN Alky Kit
2. MAFT Pro
- 3 Bar MAP Sensor (unless I get it with the Alky)
- 36" Air Temp Ext Cable
- Casper's Adapter Cable
3. 60 LB injectors
4. Dutt Neck Adapter
5. TurboTweak Chip to match everything

I am thinking that the best approach is to modify one thing at a time and test/tune for that mod, then move to the next one. This can also space out the cost over time, which isn't necessary but nice. I don't use the car daily so leaving it out of commission for a while isn't a problem.

So, with that approach, this is my idea on what order to perform these upgrades:
Alky Kit first - test/tune - Injectors and MAFTP second with new chip - test/tune - Modify IC with Dutt Neck.

Should there be dyno testing in there anywhere?

Please correct me where I am going wrong. If there are other mods I should be looking at, please let me know. I want to do this once and right.

Thanks

Andy

 

[Sleeper-6]

Sounds like you've got a good plan to work with.

One suggestion I may make is to give the Extender chip for that Translator combo a try. I'm not putting down the Turbo Tweak chips at all, from what I hear they are excellent, but if you're going to go with a Translator, why not try a chip that was designed to take advantage of it.